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Thursday, March 28
Updated: April 1, 12:34 AM ET

Promises for the baseball season

By Jim Caple
ESPN.com

Season opening resolutions we must keep this year ...

We will drive our cars within radio distance of a Detroit Tigers broadcast, tune the dial to Ernie Harwell and treat ourselves a final time to a three-hour poetry class. After more than half a century at the microphone, this is Harwell's final summer. Losing his voice will be like losing the crack of the bat or the pop of a fastball in the catcher's glove.

We will question any memorabilia dealer offering a great deal on Derek Jeter's glove.

We will root so fervently for the Minnesota Twins our friends will wonder whether we grew up in Lake Wobegon, attended Minnesota State and wear long underwear until mid-July. Bud Selig wants to eliminate the Twins, but the more they win, the better the chances they will stay in Minnesota where they belong.

We will root against the Yankees at all times.

We will bring a French phrase book for a weekend in Montreal, one of the great cities on the continent and a city that deserved so much better from baseball. We will attend a last Expos game at Olympic Stadium, root for Vladimir Guerrero, pose with Youppi and double-check to make sure that former owner Jeffrey Loria didn't lift our wallets on his way out of town.

We won't say anything bad about Mo Vaughn. Or at least not until he's on the other side of the continent.

We will row our boats to McCovey Cove and wait for a piece of history to clear the wall when Barry Bonds steps to the plate. We will sit in the bleachers at Wrigley Field, with a beer in one hand and a glove in the other when Sammy Sosa digs in. We will float on an air mattress in the pool in Phoenix and look up from our bikini-clad neighbors long enough to watch Luis Gonzalez go yard.

We won't throw anything at Chuck Knoblauch when the Royals come to town. Or at least nothing sharp.

We will sneak into the Rangers clubhouse and just listen for awhile. Texas finished in last place, 43 games behind the Mariners last season and responded by acquiring Carl Everett, John Rocker, Hideki Irabu and, most recently, Ruben Rivera. Those moves may not have solved the team's gaping pitching problems, but they turned the Rangers into the most dysfunctional family this side of the Culkins. Group hug, everyone, group hug.

We will line up early for Ichiro bobblehead night.

We will go to the local batting cage, insert our quarters into the slot, set the machine at the highest speed, strap on a helmet, step to the plate and pretend we're facing Randy Johnson and Curt Schilling. And after we swing and miss hopelessly, we'll remind ourselves that the real guys are throwing the ball at least five to 10 miles faster. With movement.

We will speak in a hoarse voice when calling in sick before going to the game.

We will exercise our naming rights. The Astros paid $2.1 million to remove Enron's name from their stadium, temporarily renaming it Astros Field. Sounds a lot better doesn't it? We can follow their lead by simply calling stadiums whatever we want. Remember. Those corporations didn't pay us a single dime when they slapped their names on our summer homes. Goodbye, Cinergy Field -- Hello, Riverfront Stadium.

We will always wear a helmet when washing our truck with Jeff Kent.

We will hope Ken Griffey Jr.'s hamstring holds firm, Pedro Martinez's shoulder stays strong, Nomar Garciaparra's wrist stays in one piece, Byung-Hyun Kim's psyche remains unshattered, David Wells' waistline stays within measure and Derek Bell's lips remain zipped.

We will refer to ourselves in the third person in honor of Rickey Henderson, who is still leading off and stealing bases at age 43.

And most importantly, no matter what they say, no matter how loud they shout, no matter how much they threaten, we will ignore Bud Selig and Donald Fehr. Because with another labor war looming, this season is too short to pay attention to anything but the game.

Box score line of the week
This is the time of the spring when pitchers are nearly stretched out, but still concentrating more on getting their work in than worrying about putting zeroes in. Which leads to some bulging figures. Chicago's Mark Buerhle and Oakland's Mark Mulder both gave up double-digit runs the same day, but this week's winning line is from Anaheim's Ramon Ortiz, who had quite a day for himself Friday.

First, Ortiz signed a three-year contract with a one-year option that is worth at least $7.25 million and possibly $11.4 million. Then he took the mound and threw a nifty 14-hitter against the Cubs. Ortiz allowed more hits in one day than Houston's Roy Oswalt has all spring (seven). His line:

5.1 IP, 14 H,6 R,6 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, 2 HR

"Fourteen hits, my goodness," he told reporters afterward. "I threw bad pitches today. Today was not my day. I wasn't thinking about money."

Lies, damn lies and statistics
Don't think it will be odd to see Ron Gardenhire managing the Twins when the season opens next week instead of Tom Kelly? The last year Kelly wasn't a manager on Opening Day, Earl Weaver, Gene Mauch, Dick Howser, Pete Rose and Whitey Herzog were. The last time Kelly didn't open the season in a dugout, Tom Seaver, Ron Guidry and Phil Niekro did. And during Kelly's 15-season tenure in the Twins dugout, other teams changed managers 124 times. ... The Expos season opener will be broadcast next week. But it's currently the only game set for broadcast (though 10 more are possible) and it will be in French. ... The Red Sox will be Rickey Henderson's eighth team and his fourth since 2000. He's changed teams 11 times. He also has more stolen bases since 1979 (1,395) than the Red Sox (1,382). ... How much of a workhorse was Curt Schilling last season? Counting the postseason, he pitched 305 innings, the first pitcher to top 300 innings since Dave Stewart and Orel Hershiser each did it in 1988. But before we are too impressed, recall that Mickey Lolich pitched 376 innings in 1971. ... Before Mo Vaughn gets too bent out of shape, consider that Barry Bonds hit more home runs last year (73) than Vaughn did in three seasons in Anaheim (69). And while he ripped Troy Percival for never taking his team to the postseason, the point is winning in the postseason and Vaughn's Red Sox teams (in 1995 and '98) were 1-6 in the postseason. ... And one final stat for what it's worth: The five most memorable home runs last season were all hit off Korean pitchers -- Chan Ho Park (Cal Ripken Jr.'s home run in the All-Star Game and Barry Bonds' record-breaking 71st home run) and Byung-Hyun Kim (Tino Martinez's game-tying home run and Derek Jeter's game-winning home run in Game 4 of the World Series and Scott Brosius' game-tying home run in Game 5).

Win Blake Stein's Money
This week's category: Like Contraction, Bullpen Carts And Quarter Beer Night, This Probably Could Have Been Better Planned.

Q: Which team went to spring training representing one city and left representing another?

From left field
After playing football players in "Breaking Away" (great movie), "Everybody's All-American" (mediocre movie) and "Any Given Sunday" (awful movie), Dennis Quaid takes the mound this week when Disney's "The Rookie" opens in theaters across the country. Quaid plays former Tampa Bay pitcher Jim Morris, who went from high school teacher to the major leagues (or at least the Devil Rays) in one summer.

The movie isn't this season's only entry into the baseball genre; "Life or Something Like It" opens in April, with Angelina Jolie playing a reporter who dates the Mariners second baseman (Bret Boone humbly says that would make her one lucky woman).

While we wait to see how these two movies stack up, here's an All-Star team of baseball movie characters (all characters must be fictional and only one player from each movie is allowed):

Pos. Player Actor Movie

C Crash Davis Kevin Costner "Bull Durham"

1B Jack Elliot Tom Selleck "Mr. Baseball"

2B Cal Cooper Christian Kane "Life or Something Like It"

SS Eddie O'Brien Gene Kelly "Take Me Out to the Ballgame"

3B Roger Dorn Corbin Bernson "Major League"

OF Kelly Leak Jackie Earl Haley "The Bad News Bears"

OF Joe Hardy Tab Hunter "Damn Yankees"

OF Roy Hobbs Robert Redford "The Natural"

SP Bingo Long Billy Dee Williams "Bingo Long Traveling All-Stars & Motor Kings"

RP Rick Vaughn Charlie Sheen "Major League"

Man. Jimmy Dugan Tom Hanks "A League of Their Own"

A: The 1970 Seattle Pilots, who went bankrupt during spring training after just one season. With Seattle fans eager for their team's second season, Bud Selig and company purchased the team on April 1 and moved the team to Milwaukee two days before the season opener. The move came so late and suddenly that players had already shipped their cars to Seattle. The team couldn't order new uniforms, so they tore "Seattle" off the jerseys and stitched "Milwaukee" in its place.

Off Base spring power rankings

1. Yankees
Yanks ready to break camp, vote on World Series shares

2. Halle Berry

Ichiro Suzuki
Oddly, she thanked everyone but David Justice

3. Twins
State passes stadium proposal with one caveat: It must be called Carl Pohlad Memorial Field

4. Dennis Quaid
Look for his brother, Randy -- he plays David Wells

5. Giants
Bad: Jeff Kent begins season on DL. Good: He's still set to jump Snake River Canyon

6. Mo Vaughn
Percival's new charge: Mo never rewinds his videos before returning them

7. Bud Selig
New pledge: Owners won't lockout fans in Minnesota. This year

8. Russell Crowe
Real reason he lost: Academy feared he was going to recite "Casey at the Bat"

9. Rangers
They're just waiting for Hannibal Lecter to clear waivers

10. Osama bin Laden
New reports claim he's still alive ... and hiding at Olympic Stadium

Infield chatter
"Putting on some pants would be a nice touch."

-- Seattle coach John McLaren to Ichiro when the outfielder was about to rush from the clubhouse to see Muhammad Ali visiting the Mariners spring-training facility.

Jim Caple is a senior writer for ESPN.com.

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